Next IT frontier is close to home

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Governments are one of the largest users of IT systems.
Organisations such as the Australian Tax Office and Centrelink are
some of the biggest IT shops around, and State Government bodies
such as NSW's Roads and Traffic Authority and Victoria's VicRoads
are not far behind.

IT in local government is a bit of a poor relation. With the
exception of Brisbane City Council, which serves a million people
and operates more like a State Government, most councils run
smallish IT establishments.

There are 691 local government authorities in Australia but many
of them are tiny. More than 100 of them serve fewer than 1000
people each, mostly in remote areas. The median population of a
local government area in Australia is about 8000, which, in terms
of an IT infrastructure, doesn't demand too much more than a few
PCs.

But IT in local government is not insignificant. There are more
than 120 local government authorities serving populations, some
with more than 50,000 people, and total expenditure on IT in local
government in Australia is about $700 million a year. The average
council spends about 3.8 per cent of its total expenditure on IT,
less than financial institutions but more than manufacturers.

There is a small industry in Australia of software developed
specifically for local governments. But, as usually happens, most
of the local companies have been bought by foreign interests.

The market leader is British software company Civica, which
bought Australian company Genasys in the 1990s and now supplies an
Australianised version of its widely used UK Authority package. Two
other Australian local government software suppliers, Stowe and
Praxa, were also acquired in the 1990s, by Canadian conglomerate
GEAC.

Some independent suppliers remain. Two of them are Queensland
based. Practical Computer Services in Toowoomba is very successful
in its home state, with more than two-thirds of all Queensland
councils, most of them smaller ones, using its software. Bigger but
not a local government specialist, is ASX-listed Technology One,
whose Finance One package is widely used in local government.

Chris Gardner is chairman of the IT Professionals Special
Interest Group for the NSW branch of Local Government Managers
Australia. We worked together as computer salesmen in the 1970s but
these days he's IT manager at Campbelltown Council in Sydney's
south-west.

"IT in local government is not too different than in most other
places," he says. "If anything, it's more interesting because it's
more diverse. As well as accounting systems, we have to handle
things as diverse as dog pounds, child-care centres and
libraries.

"But like everybody else, we're always trying to do more with
less. People see the council's roads and parks, but computers are
hidden away so they're not major vote-winning issues. There are
demands for us to supply public access internet terminals in our
libraries, but apart from that people don't think too often about
computers and their local councils."

There has been a big push at the state and federal levels
towards e-government, where government services and information are
available online. Gardner says some e-government initiatives are
taking place at the local level but a lack of resources means they
are hard to implement.

"But we're getting there," he says. "We want to be able to offer
stuff like services for builders out of hours and improved services
for ratepayers. It will come, but the most important things remain
financial management and engineering systems."

One of the best things about IT in local government, says
Gardner, is the extent to which councils can share resources.
"We're not like Coke and Pepsi - we all co-operate with each
other."

Many councils have pooled resources, partly for efficiency and
partly to stave off calls for amalgamation. The best example in the
IT space is the G5 syndicate, formed by Hornsby, Lake Macquarie,
Parramatta, Randwick and Wyong councils in Sydney and NSW Central
Coast. In 1999 the five councils announced a $100 million project
to develop a shared IT system.

One tangible way in which councils can co-operate is in the
sharing of information and experiences. For the past eight years
(except during the Olympic madness in 2000), Coffs Harbour City
Council in northern NSW has hosted the Australian Local Government
Information Technology Conference.

The event began as a venue for comparing products but today it
has grown into more of a management conference. Steve Bayliss, the
council's IT manager, said it grew out of his council's move from
proprietary Wang hardware and software to open systems in the
mid-1990s.

"Back then we were seen as pioneers, and a lot of other councils
came to us to see what we'd done. We thought it might be a good
idea to get all our suppliers together to show them how we did it,
and it's grown from there."

Now the conference attracts hundreds of local governments from
all over Australia and New Zealand. This year's event will be held
at the Novotel Pacific Bay Resort in Coffs Harbour on November
16-19. I'll be speaking at it but the real attraction is local
government IT managers sharing their experiences. You can find out
more at www.it2004.coffsharbour.nsw.gov.au